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The 1980s
- Thread starter MAJOR METAL
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- 1980's
Born in 83, but my memory is very good. Everything was neon purple, yellow, or aqua for some reason. Clothes, sports items, toys, way too much neon.
Here’s my first official old man rant:
Back in the 80’s, when I was a kid, our playgrounds were metal & wood structures on on slab of blacktop.
Burn your hands in summer, splinters if you weren’t careful, and if you fell you were at least getting a good scrape. (Not these plastic toys on padded rubber surfaces you see today) But it was fun, and when you did get hurt, you’d cry a little, get a band aid and be back out there playing.
Mom & Dad wouldn’t be contacting lawyers to sue the school cuz their little baby got a boo boo, they’d tell you to shut up and go back out and play.
We had fun, we’d learn not to fall, and if we did get hurt, we’d learn to brush ourselves off and get back at it.
Yeah, that’s how it was back in my day...
(Good memories... ha!)
Back in the 80’s, when I was a kid, our playgrounds were metal & wood structures on on slab of blacktop.
Burn your hands in summer, splinters if you weren’t careful, and if you fell you were at least getting a good scrape. (Not these plastic toys on padded rubber surfaces you see today) But it was fun, and when you did get hurt, you’d cry a little, get a band aid and be back out there playing.
Mom & Dad wouldn’t be contacting lawyers to sue the school cuz their little baby got a boo boo, they’d tell you to shut up and go back out and play.
We had fun, we’d learn not to fall, and if we did get hurt, we’d learn to brush ourselves off and get back at it.
Yeah, that’s how it was back in my day...
(Good memories... ha!)
Telephones had cords, and a big, four-prong plug. If you called someone the phone could ring forever (which meant they were not at home). Cars had V8’s and sounded like it - not like a lawn mower on steroids. Political correctness wasn’t born yet. Snowflakes were things you caught on your tongue in December. Social media consisted of flipping someone the bird if they cut you off or giving someone a thumbs up if they drove a cool car.
Yeah, sometimes I miss the 80’s...
Yeah, sometimes I miss the 80’s...
/also it seemed everyone hung out at the park back then. Kids playing catch, hippies playing guitars, teens playing basketball with a boom box. Even the stoners all hung out smoking doobs and drinking little kings. Hair was bigger, jeans were tighter.
buldog5151bass
Kibble, milkbones, and P Basses. And redheads.
The world was less PC and idiot proof, which is both good and bad.
Kid could, and did, roam free after school and on weekends.
People interacted with each other more, since they were not tethered to their phones/the internet. I miss this the most.
Made in the USA (other than cars) was a mark of quality, and some things were actually made in the USA.
There were pay phones.
I could go on. The world always changes.
Kid could, and did, roam free after school and on weekends.
People interacted with each other more, since they were not tethered to their phones/the internet. I miss this the most.
Made in the USA (other than cars) was a mark of quality, and some things were actually made in the USA.
There were pay phones.
I could go on. The world always changes.
UNSAFE AT ANY SPEED , I'm sure the PC Ralphe Nader's of modern day saw to it these things were banned to the scrap heap. I can just see todays Bobby or Susie's parents making them wear a helmet and knee and elbow pads to board one of these.
Hundreds of TV channels to watch with nothing worth watching vs 20 or 30 TV channels and nothing worth watching.
MTV was just ONE of those channels and they played music.
Ronald Ragan
and Alf
Bassist4Eris
Frat-Pack Sympathizer
Aside from the occasional hit from the likes of Van Halen, Ratt or Twisted Sister, there was almost no hard rock on the radio whatsoever. By the end of the 80s, power ballads were all the rage, but real rock songs almost never got airplay. It's one of the reasons that 1991 felt like such a radical upheaval for mainstream music.
I was born in '71. So my preteen and teen years were in the 80s.
People weren't as sensitive. We didn't all walk around on eggshells.
Technology grew in leaps, but seemed to be kept in perspective more back then. Video games were just one of your toys.... And most of your other toys involved the outdoors.
People..... ACTUAL humans..... not virtual humans..... would gather in the same home and share food and talk to each other. Birthdays were celebrated in person. Anniversaries were celebrated with gatherings.
Most cars were unimaginative and just plain awful.
Music was more fun. There's not much fun in music today. There are exceptions, but not many.
Race relations didn't seem nearly as tense. I feel like they were (of course) pretty bad up until the mid 70s or so. Then we "took a break" for the most part until maybe 10 or 12 years ago. I admit I can only speak to my surroundings and the media.
Not everything was awesome. But it seemed like a good balance of technology, social issues, fun, art, economy, etc. It seems everything is pure turmoil these days. But that's just perception. I thjink the media is convincing us that everything is being destroyed so that we turn to them for "answers". In reality, nothing is being destroyed. We aren't beating each other over the heads every day. Most if us don't hate anyone at all. Back the we understood that. These days everything is "us vs them". We have raised a couple if generations to believe that the planet is crumbling, every CEO lives to starve babies and kill old people while stealing from the masses, and every religion and race and gender hates every other religion race and gender. We mostly seemed to get along here in the states in the 80s. The only thing we "feared" (again mostly drummed up by the media) was nuclear war. There was never going to be a nuclear war any more than there will be today. Other than that, we seemed to mostly be okn the same team back then. Even for all of our problems we were all Americans. And we loved our country warts and all. We mainly focused on what was good about it, and what still needed work, rather than crazy talk of scrapping the whole thing for some other system.
Not everything was perfect. Not everything now is busted. But I rather enjoyed humans more back then. We weren't as stressed out for the most part. We weren't as sensitive. We talked more. We hugged and laughed more. We cracked jokes about each other more. We laughed at ourselves more.
As a teenager from '86-'90 I made from $200-$500 a weekend playing in a classic rock cover band that never traveled more than 60 miles. We had to turn down shows.
I don't want to go back. I love my life now. And if I took a different path I might not end up here again. But I wish we could borrow some late 70s and 80s and bring it here.
Slightly off topic. Do you guys remember 1976? The bicentennial? Man, EVERYTHING was red white and blue. And we were all so proud. I think that carried over into the early 80s as well.
If you look back at media reports you'll see a lot about homelessness. But it wasn't statistically any worse than any other period. It wasn't solved. But it wasn't any worse.
I guess I'm rambling. All I know is this.i could play outside throiughout my neighborhood until dark back then. We as a family picked up hitchhikers and have them food and money. My kids can't play outside without even in our nice neighborhood. And my kids bought some food for a homeless guy at the grocery store yesterday. We couldn't give him money because there's about a 70% chance he was a scammer. Then when we got out to give him the food I took security measures. He didn't say thanks and hid the food in the bushes so as to avoid fending off others.
Times are different. Not all bad. But not as good in my view.
People weren't as sensitive. We didn't all walk around on eggshells.
Technology grew in leaps, but seemed to be kept in perspective more back then. Video games were just one of your toys.... And most of your other toys involved the outdoors.
People..... ACTUAL humans..... not virtual humans..... would gather in the same home and share food and talk to each other. Birthdays were celebrated in person. Anniversaries were celebrated with gatherings.
Most cars were unimaginative and just plain awful.
Music was more fun. There's not much fun in music today. There are exceptions, but not many.
Race relations didn't seem nearly as tense. I feel like they were (of course) pretty bad up until the mid 70s or so. Then we "took a break" for the most part until maybe 10 or 12 years ago. I admit I can only speak to my surroundings and the media.
Not everything was awesome. But it seemed like a good balance of technology, social issues, fun, art, economy, etc. It seems everything is pure turmoil these days. But that's just perception. I thjink the media is convincing us that everything is being destroyed so that we turn to them for "answers". In reality, nothing is being destroyed. We aren't beating each other over the heads every day. Most if us don't hate anyone at all. Back the we understood that. These days everything is "us vs them". We have raised a couple if generations to believe that the planet is crumbling, every CEO lives to starve babies and kill old people while stealing from the masses, and every religion and race and gender hates every other religion race and gender. We mostly seemed to get along here in the states in the 80s. The only thing we "feared" (again mostly drummed up by the media) was nuclear war. There was never going to be a nuclear war any more than there will be today. Other than that, we seemed to mostly be okn the same team back then. Even for all of our problems we were all Americans. And we loved our country warts and all. We mainly focused on what was good about it, and what still needed work, rather than crazy talk of scrapping the whole thing for some other system.
Not everything was perfect. Not everything now is busted. But I rather enjoyed humans more back then. We weren't as stressed out for the most part. We weren't as sensitive. We talked more. We hugged and laughed more. We cracked jokes about each other more. We laughed at ourselves more.
As a teenager from '86-'90 I made from $200-$500 a weekend playing in a classic rock cover band that never traveled more than 60 miles. We had to turn down shows.
I don't want to go back. I love my life now. And if I took a different path I might not end up here again. But I wish we could borrow some late 70s and 80s and bring it here.
Slightly off topic. Do you guys remember 1976? The bicentennial? Man, EVERYTHING was red white and blue. And we were all so proud. I think that carried over into the early 80s as well.
If you look back at media reports you'll see a lot about homelessness. But it wasn't statistically any worse than any other period. It wasn't solved. But it wasn't any worse.
I guess I'm rambling. All I know is this.i could play outside throiughout my neighborhood until dark back then. We as a family picked up hitchhikers and have them food and money. My kids can't play outside without even in our nice neighborhood. And my kids bought some food for a homeless guy at the grocery store yesterday. We couldn't give him money because there's about a 70% chance he was a scammer. Then when we got out to give him the food I took security measures. He didn't say thanks and hid the food in the bushes so as to avoid fending off others.
Times are different. Not all bad. But not as good in my view.
Ding Ding Ding Ding. We have a winner.
I'm amazed more people never made the connection.
Instead of the internet, we had Encyclopedia Brittanica. Rows and rows of them.
We used to have to walk through 9 feet (both ways) of shag carpet to change the TV channels. No remotes. I WAS the remote.
The list goes on and on. Like, for instance, cassettes, or, Who shot J.R.?
Jams, parachute pants, breakdancing, Reebok Pumps....
We used to have to walk through 9 feet (both ways) of shag carpet to change the TV channels. No remotes. I WAS the remote.
The list goes on and on. Like, for instance, cassettes, or, Who shot J.R.?
Jams, parachute pants, breakdancing, Reebok Pumps....
The 80s were my 20s. Some of my personal best and worst of times. Musically, the possibilities seemed to explode out of corporate stodginess (remember "Corporate Rock Sucks" t-shirts/stickers?). The golden age of college radio seemed to coincide with my stint on my college station (78-82) and for a several years afterward. MTV started and actually played music. Fashion trends got daring (and sometimes, in retrospect, regrettable.) Some great independent films, and some interesting literature. Many more great clubs than there are now. Seemed much more carefree, though part of that may have been my youth.
I was thinking about my recollection of the 80s. I was born in 83 so my memories start at what, 88? I have vague memories of a few things but tv and movies and filled in the rest. It seemed like everyone was slightly unconformable in their clothes and always a little bit sweaty.
